An enlarged field of teams will descend to the Greyhounds home cross country course Saturday morning from Albany, Savannah, Augusta and Athens as Jones County once again hosts its home meet. Jones County will host the GHSA sectionals for a pair of classifications in November, rooting a desire for teams get a preview of the Greyhounds’ home course. As a result, more teams have sought to enter this year’s event, giving the JCHS cross country program a good problem to have – managing a larger field of teams.
“We’re expecting some good races. Teams are coming from all over to preview the course for sectionals,” Jones County head cross country coach Geoff Moore said.
How many more cross country teams will be in the course off of Howard Roberts Road? Usually, the Greyhound Invitational draws around 20 teams. This year’s has around 50 high school teams entered and 20 from middle schools.
“It’s not even close, the numbers of teams that’ll be there,” Moore said. “Greenbrier is going to be there. Stockbridge will be there, and they have some good runners. It’ll be very competitive.”
In years past, the varsity meets consisted of just one boys and girls meet. To adapt, Saturday morning’s races across all divisions will have a total of eight races, four being varsity events.
“The number of teams is out of sight. We’ll have 20 teams in the big races and 23 in the small race,” Moore said. “I don’t know that we’ve ever had more than 20 teams before.”
The Greyhounds and Lady Greyhounds will be part of the day’s first two events – the boys and girls large school races at 8:15 a.m. and 8:45 a.m. for teams in the AAAA, AAAAA and AAAAAA classifications.
The lower school races for teams from private schools and the A, AA and AAA classifications will follow at 9:15 a.m. and 9:45 a.m. with boys and girls JV races at 10:15 a.m. and 11 a.m. Boys and girls middle school races will wrap up the action at 11:45 a.m. and 12:15 p.m. prior to awards being presented.
“We’re expecting a big crowd; there’s well over 1,000 kids signed up,” Moore said.
It’ll all be on a Saturday that’s a highlight of the Greyhounds season for one simplistic reason – that the meet is close to home. After going to and either winning or finishing near the front of the field at places like Hazelhurst, Whitesburg and Carrollton, the Greyhounds and Lady Greyhounds will trade a bus ride for the comfort of sleeping in their own beds the night before the meet as well as friends and family being able to easily seem them compete.
“They know the course better than anybody. They worked out on it multiple times last week.
They know how far they have to go on the course and how far in they are. That’s a definite advantage,” Moore said.
“There’s pride in it, too. They know they don’t have many more chances on this course, so they want to make the most of it. As well as we’ve been doing, we should have a good race Saturday morning.”
